The Dacoit’s Toe

Tenali Raman had a collection of stories that he could tell on every occasion. Sometimes they were stories of great wisdom, and sometimes they were pure fun.
One day, travelling home to Hampi from a distant part of the kingdom, Tenali Raman came upon a group of soldiers camping for the night. It was a cold winter, so they had gathered around a large bonfire. They were telling the stories of their feats of bravery in earlier battles. Each one tried to tell a story better than the one before!


One old soldier said that he had killed ten enemy soldiers all by himself during a battle. Then a big soldier told the story of how a fort was conquered all because of him: he alone held off a whole regiment attacking the fort. The next one was a small but sturdy old warrior. He narrated how he had been caught by the enemy and put into prison during war.
The stories continued as the night wore on. All the soldiers had some stories to tell. Finally, when everyone had finished, the soldiers looked at Tenali Raman. One of them said, “Well sir, we know you are not a soldier; you won’t be able to tell us any stories of war and valour, will you?” And all the others joined in the laughter.


“Oh, I have a story too, though I am not a soldier,” replied Tenali Raman, “I was travelling home to Hampi one night like I am travelling today. I saw a large tent on the way which seemed to be deserted. I crept close to it and peeped in. There was a huge man lying inside it. No one else was around.
Going closer, I saw that he was a well-known and widely feared dacoit who had looted and killed people in the villages around. I took out my sword and cut off his toe and then fled from there.”

There was murmuring among the group around the fire. One of the old soldiers asked, “Why did you cut off his toe? If he was lying there unconscious, you should have cut off his head.”
Tenali Raman replied seriously, “Oh, I couldn’t do that. You see; someone had already done that. His head was lying in the tent too.”
There was a minute of shocked silence, and then all the soldiers burst out laughing!

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